What do you think is the future of Japan?

Because there is a lot of Japanese ownership of land and business here, I would expect an increase in immigration to the US, specifically the Bay Area.
Japan will recover. This is a remarkable land full of come-back and survivablity.

I think that the rebuilding effort will take some years, but the indomitable spirit of the Japanese people will prevail.

Japan will recover. Their rate of personal savings is among the highest in the world. Despite their rate of industrialization, they have a national health insurance plan where the government covers 70% of health care expenses, the individual pays for the other 30%. Preventive care is covered in full. Japan is primarily a closed economic system; they sell to their own first. Among the things that they import are oil, lumber and food, primarily meat.

The two things that will slow recovery are 1) the fact that nuclear energy accounts for ⅓ of the energy that powers their economy, and they are losing 25% of that energy source, 2) in a land-strapped country, the radioactive contamination of land will hamper their development.

Japan is not politically fragmented; they will dig in and get done what needs to be done.

I would like to say things will be just fine there but things are not over yet. The issue is not just Japan but things of this nature are going to increase and there is going to be so much more happening. It is a really tough era that the world is going through and it is going to get worse before it finally gets better but when things get better they are going to be the most unusual and fantastic things that mankind has ever or will ever see or imagine. The growth in knowledge and technology is going to go beyond anything that we can even picture. Really wonderful things to look forward too.

Yes they Will recover. They are extra-ordinarily strong people that have incredible acceptance of nature and that shi* happens (many of our media outlets find that a reason to portray the Japanese as cold heartless unemotional people).
Sure it will affect us all financially but we should take a tip from the Japanese and deal with things as they are dealt to us and not run around in furore like blue-assed flies round a turd.

I don’t think it’ll take very long. Maybe in three to five years, there won’t be any evidence left that there was a disaster. I’ll bet most people are insured. The major problem will be finding labor to rebuild.

The nuclear plants will be stabilized and then mothballed, or whatever they do with old nuclear plants. They’ll have to find new sources of energy. I don’t know where they will turn. They will certainly be buying more oil, which should put some upward pressure on the price of crude.

The workers will be an interesting problem. They will probably have to hire some from other countries. Then they will want to send them home when they are no longer needed. Or maybe not. The Japanese population is declining fairly rapidly and that’s a big problem. Will they let foreign workers stay on? Probably not. But they should.

Yes, they will recover within a few years given that the nuclear wost-case scenario won’t become reality. As I understand it the next 48 hours are critical, especially in unit 4. I’m waiting for news about the high-resolution picture taken by an American drone.

History has proved to us that they have recovered from what was much worse in a short amount of time, so I would think that they will do the same now too.